This is the docu-blog about the fashion label, Earl of Bedlam. Beginning from the first inception of the idea, we - that'll be Mr. Mark Wesley and Lady C - hope our story might provide a valuable real-time record of the process of establishing a better way of dressing. All our clothes are made in London from only the best British fabrics and they celebrate the spirit of our town, from the grottiest corner to the swankiest salon.
It appears we have become a quarterly periodical. It is nigh on three months since the last post and one's tail is between one's legs. Yes, we're in the Dog House - and not, contrary to what you might expect, the public house of that name in Kennington (though saying that, we did pop in to deliver the new Guv'nor's "Alfie" whistle, inspired by a youthful Michael Caine). http://www.thedoghouselondon.com
What do I plead? Only that I prefer to post a story with a wet nose, a tummy and a tail; a beginning, a middle and an end, rather than leave you hanging for a conclusion.
But some things just can't be hurried.
Anyway, here's what one wears in the Dog House these days, a "tonic" mohair sharkskin - for that smooth look with bite. Real mussel shell buttons, too. On the right, Anthony's "Alfie" suit:
So to get on with the catching up, one afternoon, during the Dog Days of summer, a gentleman arrived for his first appointment. We asked the usual question - who or what had brought him to us? "Jools Holland recommended you," he replied.
For our visitor was Dave Swift, Jool's bass player of twenty-five years and counting.
"That's extremely nice of him," we said, "Not least as we haven't made him anything!"
"Well what's he *$%^£* well doing recommending something he hasn't tried?!"
A perfectly reasonable challenge. We managed to persuade him to stay with the help of grappling irons and the net over the door. He couldn't make a speedy escape down the steep stairs of our studio as he had brought along his dog house bass, an upright bespoke made for him by another South London craftsman, Roger Dawson of Deptford. He wanted to demonstrate the scope of movement required when he takes the curvaceous beauty in his arms. http://www.daveswiftbass.com
He must have been at least half happy with his suit as he promptly put in an order for the next one and invited us to see Jools' band at Hampton Court Palace. It was a golden evening in early June, and the open air courtyard glowed in the sunset. I waved to the ghost of Alice, my great grandmother, who had lived in a "grace & favour" apartment under the clock tower.
My great grandmother Alice lived under the clock which must have been a bit noisy. Anyway there was a joyful racket the night we were there
Before they went on stage we drank their rider in the house provided for the band, as a mere dressing "room" could not accommodate their number.
I went dressed as Axl Rose, for no particular reason
Bill & Marcela Curbishley, Jools Holland, Mr Wesley and Dave Swift
Prior to that night, we had celebrated Mr Wesley's birthday on June 1st at another open air event - "Songs in the Key of London". This was organised organised by Chris Difford (Jools' old bandmate from Squeeze, for whom we are also making a suit) to benefit the Elton John AIDS Foundation in the Regents Park amphitheatre. We give joint honours for the night to the Strypes http://thestrypes.com, who rocked out, and to Gregory Porter, who sang a most tender version of "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square". Dave was with us that evening and introduced us to Alfred, who is making a documentary film about Gregory http://www.gregoryporter.com. We swapped information and said we'd get together at some point.
Meanwhile some international football tournament came and went, and the poppies opened in the wildflower meadow in the Imperial War Museum, now itself reopened, to inspire a silk / linen jacket for Steve:
Pocket detail
Another linen jacket, this one made for Grant, was lined in saucy silk (found at http://www.biddlesawyersilks.com), as sensuous as diving into a tub of ice cream. What appears to be frost flakes are, on closer inspection, licentious ladies in the throes of a Busby Berkeley routine:
Someone else who fancied a linen suit was Roger Daltrey - 'The colour of 'airy string" was his precise brief and we found that under another name in the Scabal "Vintage Linen" book: http://www.scabal.com
We had the fitting at his manager's office, for the suit and coat we have made Roger were presents from Bill. Bill had imagined Roger would choose a traditional, dark worsted suit and expressed an opinion that linen can get, well, crumpled. But that is part of its intrinsic cool.
"I LIKE the crumples," retorted Roger, "I"M a bit crumpled."http://thewho.com
Roger had also fancied the look of the "Clancey" coat that Mr Wesley was wearing when we first met him. Pointing at it, he proclaimed, "I'll have that". So we recreated it in the same Harris Tweed http://www.harristweed.org but custom printed the lining with the help of our pals at Hatley Print, http://www.hatleyprint.co.uk/Hatley_Print_Digital/Hatley_Print.html, to make it very much his own:
We were properly privileged to see Roger perform with Wilko Johnson at Shepherd's Bush Empire way back in February and delighted to see the huge success of their record "Going Back Home" which has my most darling drummer Dylan Howe bashing the skins http://dylanhowe.com.
But an even bigger cause for celebration is the news that Wilko's original "hopeless" diagnosis may have been mis-delivered. We sincerely hope and pray that is the case and look forward to the follow up release.
Wilko Johnson and Roger Daltrey on stage at the Shepherd's Bush Empire
Love this photo of Bill Curbishley, Mr Wesley & Norman Watt-Roy, bass legend of the Blockheads and now Wilko
When Dylan Howe first turned up at my jam to play he wasn't strictly, in an uptight, legal sense, old enough to be there #proud
Wishing a long and happy life to both these gentlemen
Thanks to my old RADA class mate, our friend Helen Patton, grand-daughter of the General who made a name for himself in the First World War before making a legend of himself in the Second, we were invited to Highclere Castle on August 3rd for the century commemorations. We took along Ma Butler as she bears more than a passing resemblance to Shirley Maclaine and we thought we might sit her in a booth and sell faux-tographs to people excited to be at the location of some telly programme called "Downton Abbey".
Mr Wesley chats to Ingmar Patton, our one-time intern, on the driveway of Highclere Castle
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Ma Butler, me in the new Bedlam tricorn straw hat, and Mr Wesley
Tiger Moth engines clattered in sky over the ramparts
Tiger Moths dog fighting in the sky
As we left, Tiger Moth bi-planes did a thrilling demonstration dog fight in the sky but we had to get back... to collect the Puppy of Peace.
Yes, we sped back to London to give this story its tail. After weeks of waiting and watching him grow with the litter at the Royal Oak pub behind our studio, we finally got to bring Brian home. Named in honour of our dear friend Brian Leitch, suddenly and unexpectedly lost to us on July 8th in Los Angeles, we hope some of Brian's kind and witty spark transferred to this bright little soul.
First meeting with Brian - I called his name over the sleeping litter and he opened his eyes, scrambled over the snoring bodies of his siblings and came to me
Brought home when he was old enough to leave his mummy & daddy. That's us now.
Brian Edward de Bedlam comes to the studio with us every day and pretty much every where we go he tags along. And exudes charm and other substances, some of them liquid, some of the solid. A few days after he had joined our household, we received a phone call at 8.00 am on August 8th from Alfred, whom we had met at Regent's Park on Mr Wesley's birthday. He asked if we could make a dinner jacket for Gregory Porter to wear that night at the BBC Proms "Battle of the Big Bands" as he had just got off a plane without his. We regretted that we could not work that fast. They asked if we had a sample in his size - which is as substantial as his talent, at 6'5". I was about to give them a number for Moss Bros when I remembered through the early morning haze that we still had lovely Dolf Sweerts' dinner jacket hanging on the rail. My first call was to him, to ask if we fancied vicariously performing at the Royal Albert Hall that night. With typically generous good humour he said of course, as long as he had it back by Wednesday. And so we delivered Dolf's jacket backstage at the RAH and Gregory looked and sounded magnificent in it.
Mr Wesley with Gregory Porter, backstage at the Royal Albert Hall
Gregory on stage in Dolf's dinner jacket
The next morning we arrived at the hotel to retrieve it and took Brian along in his basket. Gregory showed his appreciation of us having helped him out in a jam by ordering a three-piece suit and an extra waistcoat in, what else, Puppy Tooth check (son of Hound's Tooth).
Gregory Porter gets cuddly with Brian the puppy
The Puppy Tooth check Gregory chose from the latest J&J Minnis bunch, Worsted Alsport II
Next to touch down was our own Nile Rodgers, in London to be reunited with Duran Duran http://www.duranduran.com and to work on their new album. We were honoured that he wished to give them, and Mark Ronson, a selection of our t-shirts So we presented ourselves at the studio and John Taylor came out to the reception, scooped up Brian and led us into the recording suite. Nile didn't stay too long as he had to have his latest cancer check on Harley Street - which we are relieved to report came back all clear. So he left the band to deal with the puppy pandemonium. Simon Le Bon next had his cuddles before offering Nick Rhodes his moment with Brian. Nick was occupied with his laptop and replied that he was alright, thanks. "What's the matter with you? Don't you like dogs?" demanded his band mates.
"Yes I like dogs, I just don't need one right now," was his response, and, indeed, his prerogative. So someone placed Brian on the cushion next to him. And of course, moments later, a river of wee rolled towards Mr. Rhodes.
Brian whispers to Simon; Nile in the background.
Nile in his Bedlam "Palio" jeans which we think he's taken off since he received them, but not much! Afterwards he posted,"I've just had a great week recording in Duran Duran's studio. I think we're closer than we've ever been."
Really extremely cute. And the puppy's not bad neither.
So there we have it, a Dog Blog with a wet nose, a warm round tummy, and a waggily tail.
There is, however, a sad coda to this edition - we have referenced above two people, Wilko and Nile, who fought cancer and are thankfully now in remission. It was with great sadness that we learnt in June that our client Andy Wilson was not so lucky. We met him three times only, on the day he came to choose his fabric; at his fitting (after which he went straight to hospital for an operation); and on the day he came to collect it. So only three occasions, but we were honoured to know him at an extraordinarily intense, heightened time for him and his family. Although he was visibly weak, we were heartened to see the pleasure it gave him to take his finished jacket. Last week we saw Andy's wife Emma and she told us that their son is now wearing it for his dad. We hope it serves him well.
Mr Wesley with Andy & Emma Wilson. We take this memory of him smiling from our last meeting.
It's all about politics today, and they have roused me from my blogging torpor. There's much ado about apathy, and the fact that two thirds of people did not vote and seemingly don't care, which is exactly how evil steals a march, when the rest of us roll over (to paraphrase Edmund Burke, being quoted widely thanks to UKIP's success at the polls). A kick to the consciousness of the main parties here in Great Britain was overdue, but writing in the capacity of my own opinion (I voted, I'm entitled to one), how about getting at them by boosting the Green Party or the - as yet limited availability - brand new Reality Party? It was launched last month in Manchester on April 29th by founder Bez, p.k.a. maracas master, interpretive dancer and ambience co-ordinator from the Happy Mondays, while wearing his Bedlam t-shirt.
Bez launching the Reality Party (Photograph by Elspeth Moore)
They may have come third with their candidate in Salford, but a mere twenty-three votes behind the Conservatives.
Honorary Bedlamite Jacky Carroll ordered Bez one of our "God Save the Queen" bee-shirts for his 50th birthday present - he is a keen apiarist apparently, these days, so we hope he proves to be a new breed of pollentician. Here she is presenting it at his party:
Photographs by Elspeth Moore (to whom, many thanks)
He was by all accounts delighted, as were we to receive this fabulous photograph:
Loving your country without stomping on everyone else ought to be an achievable human goal. We received an interesting commission lately, to design a curtain for the foyer of the Bermondsey Square Hotel http://www.bermondseysquarehotel.co.uk, and its other side was to coordinate with their "GB Bar & Grill". This weekend (Saturday May 24th) the Daily Telegraph (winners of the Best Travel Website award) included them in their Fab Five hotels on the Southbank:
The hotel is one of twelve that make up the Bespoke Group and wishing to play up that aspect, they have appointed us as their in-house tailor. We will be in residence this coming Friday, May 30th, and subsequently every last Friday of the month to give consultations and take orders (that's the idea!). Having spent time in the United States I became accustomed to seeing flags proudly displayed on just about every front lawn, while in the United Kingdom people had become embarrassed of being mistaken for a football hooligan or rabid racist. So we have made our attempt to reclaim it, firstly with the tweed Union Jack that plays to the muted colours of the restaurant:
Robert Holland, manager of the Bermondsey Square Hotel with his deputy Chris
And on the flip side is the St George Cross mounted on black to chime with the strong graphic scheme of the reception. Here is the first lady to check in after it was installed:
We have also made waistcoats for the restaurant staff and enjoyed the practicality of the project, choosing a wool /poly mix fabric so that they can be cleaned as per the necessity of workwear.
Anyway we have now been asked to work on designs for the staff at the Gotham - a new hotel they will be opening in Manchester next year. We look forward to Bez holding an election victory party there!
France, meanwhile, is also having a resurgence of prehistoric tribalism. Back in April, demonstrating pan-European appreciation, we were thrilled to be invited by the glamourous champion of the arts, Canadienne TV music show Genevieve Borne (she is the Jools Holland of Canada) to the opening of the Jean Paul Gaultier exhibition at the Barbican. We highly commend it to you, it takes up the baton of exhibiting fashion from the YSL expo of a few years back and runs with it hysterically around the track. JPG was there and extolled the creative inspiration that London has afforded him, a visiting foreigner, throughout his career. He helped us enjoy a proud sense of our nationality by declaring that he can personally dismiss the "No sex please, we're British" myth. "I know eet eez a lie!"
So we shall end with our gallery of Vive la Euro-Love, and the hope that we can love ourselves and live and let love.
Happily co-existing
The EoB and JPG
JPG and Lady C
The mannequins winked and spoke and twitched
It's a Euro love-in man, flower power dressing xxx
On Friday the bidding opened for a clutch of cool stuff, the proceeds from which will go to benefit the children's communication charity, "I CAN". You can watch Arsenal play (COYG!); hang out with Sir Paul McCartney and / or Rod Stewart; hang a water colour by HRH Prince Charles on your wall; hang one of our bespoke suits in your closet; there's a plethora of temptation and it's all going to Make A Difference so please do throw yourself into this. We must thank Huddersfield Fine Worsted for donating the fabric for the suit, which can be for a lady or gentleman and in either a country tweed or City cloth. You've got until Sunday March 16th before the auction ends.
Get drunk and put your hand in the air, come on: http://ican.auction-bid.org/micro2.php
If you want to leap straight to the suit, it's here: http://ican.auction-bid.org/micro2.php#lightbox-popup107
This organisation has just celebrated, surprisingly - well, I was surprised - its 125th anniversary and as part of that they are running the Million Lost VoicesAppeal of which Dame Judi Dench is patron. Her Majesty The Queen is Patron of the charity as a whole. In the last two years they have raised over £2million to support children aged 3-11 years with communication difficulties across the UK. I CAN also runs two Schools for children with severe speech, language and communication needs.
Pupils from one of these, the Meath School, performed with the London Chamber Orchestra last month at St. James' Palace and we were privileged to be there. Trying to convey how moving it was I find myself at a loss to do it justice. The children made the point perfectly, demonstrating as they sang the problems they overcome and the progress they can make with the specialist attention.
I'll stick with my sartorial small talk and tell you that Mr Wesley looked lethally slick in his black tie. We made a skirt from the Ginger Chutney tartan for me and a gold "King and I" top with the Bedlam biker zips in the sleeves (more of that later - it managed to present me in some sort of decorum on this night but led me into shame a few days later).
We brushed ourselves up and dusted ourselves down
Mr Wesley looking deadly next to the calico for one of our new jacket styles
HRH The Duchess of Cornwall and Ma Butler with him and me lurking
So we are delighted to be able to help in some way and hope that you may find something in the selection that tickles your fancy and gets your bidding paddle aloft. To register, text "ICAN" to 88850.
When we were making enquiries for help in this area, I CAN was by far the most accessible and helpful resource.
From dignity to debauchery is only a few days slide, and sure enough I wore the same outfit for the Chinese Burns party held on Burns Night at our friend James' club, a tea-house opium den jazz club in London Bridge http://www.cecilslondon.com/
The ebullient band leader asked who was wearing tartan and I made the mistake of showing off (don't do it kids) and stood up. Having drawn attention to myself, he then came to lead me on to the dance floor, something that brings on in your correspondent a rigor mortis of terror. He proceeded to twirl me about, raising my arms aloft. You may remember I described the gold top as Siamese in style, cut under the bust. The action of twirling about like Lorna bleedin' Doone caused it to rise up thus exposing my embonpoint to the amusement of whoever copped an eyeful. Our friend Bill, it behoves me to mention, had arrived in mufti (it is a dressy affair) so we leant him the red velvet smoking jacket and fez that we just happened to have in the trunk of the car. He only won "Best Dressed Gentleman". Honest to Goodness, you make an effort and humiliation is the reward; rock up n'importe quoi and waltz off with glory. To celebrate this accolade, we took a little turn on the floor once more, but with my arms firmly by my side that time. Some grainy footage of this exists, which I share with you below. Oddly, this had disappeared from the computer when uploading and then, equally mysteriously, has now reappeared, but such are the potent powers at Bill's disposal.
So January slunk across the sky disguised as a rain cloud. I didn't post one blog. Let's resolve to not let that happen again for a while.
Our two days at Barclays Bank in Hanover Square to cover London Collections: Men was extended to the whole week. Mark and his dad (both our dads are Arthurs) covered the mannequins in strips of pasted Financial Times and then we chose the clothes we would display before reporting to clock in at 9am on Jan 6th.
It was funny watching people walk by, double take, then come in to talk to us, not only to pay a bill. It was a thoroughly worthwhile exercise and we are really grateful to Osman and the team there who made us feel welcome and interesting, indeed we were quite disappointed not to be asked to tag along to their Austin Powers themed Christmas party on the Friday night. Glad to see Barclays being careful with the pennies and celebrating Christmas in January when you get better rates for party bookings.
On the Wednesday we had a host of visitors including Chris & Ed from Jocks & Nerds magazine http://www.jocksandnerds.com/, as well as their roving news hound Mark Webster, and Bill & Marcela Curbishley. They gamely posed outside - indeed Marcela was our demonstration fitting, trying her two jackets in the foyer while the business of life went on around her.
The banner on the magazine is "Style. History. Culture" and we make the case that Bill is a Titan of all three, having produced Quadrophenia, Tommy, McVicar and, in cinemas now, The Railway Man. Lucky he has Marcela to represent Beauty for him ; )
If you've seen the big sexy films of January, American Hustle and Wolf of Wall Street, go see The Railway Man next. It tells the true story of Eric Lomax, a trainspotter nerd in the British Army. He gets closer than anyone would want to the business of railways when he and his division are set to build the Thai-Burma line in the Japanese prisoner of war camp. This history was memorably portrayed in "Bridge over the River Kwai" but is one theatre of war that has often been overlooked. When I was a little girl we lived next door to a gentleman veteran who was in one of those camps and would hear him awake screaming in the night. So it's not a rom com or in any way light entertainment but if your soul needs some fibre, we recommend it most highly. Wouldn't that be something, if the conclusion caught on - that forgiveness is more powerful than revenge. All the cast do marvellous work, the older leads played by Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth, but Jeremy Irving carries the honours as young Lomax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Railway_Man_(film)
The Jay B overcoat in Harris tweed with red piping, in our window on Hanover Square
On Friday lunchtime, I put in a call to GQ magazine, some twenty odd yards away in Vogue House. Jonathan Heaf, Features Director of British GQ, assured me he'd be over to see us. By 4.45pm he had yet to appear. I felt that queasiness as I redialled that comes from the uncomfortable suspicion that you might be a pest. "Argh! I forgot! I'm coming right now!" he proclaimed and seconds later there he was. Life Lesson # 6152 - always make the call. Feel the fear and do it anyway. That meet and greet was a splendid closing quarter of an hour to our week of showcasing in the West End.
And on Monday we were back at 9am because we just couldn't stay away. But mostly to clear away:
One of the things we were excited to tell Jonathan about was our jeans. A few weeks ago a gentleman called up to ask our advice on manufacturing in the UK (we are on an online register for making in the UK www.letsmakeithere.org ). I helped where I could and then he mentioned that they sourced their fabric from London and its environs. "London?!"
Yes, he assured me. The London Cloth Company.
I was on the phone in two seconds flat and spoke for almost an hour to Daniel as I looked through his website. My heart quivered as I scrolled - he makes denim. No one has woven cloth in London for a century. No one has made denim in the UK, anywhere, for Lord knows how long. HE GETS WOOL FROM THE CITY FARM SHEEP for one of his cloths!! Excuse me shouting, it is just so exciting. The whole "de Nimes" thing is an urban myth put about by the dastardly French he maintains. The soldiers of the South in the Civil War couldn't wear wool as it was too darn hot, and anyway, think about what fills their fields down there - not sheep, COTTON. We made an appointment to visit a few days later. Meeting Daniel was a revelation. He is only thirty-two but it is like being in the presence of a master, the Dalai Lama of the loom, the Young Wizard of Warp & Weft. I made a little film of him talking. We are still walking ten feet off the ground. I would have hesitated to reveal this so soon, but Ralph Lauren has already found him and The Times and the Evening Standard both ran pieces last week on the marvel that is Daniel.
Here's my entry for Best Documentary Short then: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aIxIVkSfGA&feature=youtu.be
In a nutshell, Daniel used to make clothes for film and TV, then he found a loom in a barn in Wales and thought that would be a fun project, tinkering with that. And that's what you get from a spot of tinkering. It inevitably leads to all consuming passion:
It's so bloody cold up there in North London that the cat has to sleep under a hypothermia blanket. And Mr Wesley picked up some cloth from the floor, an experiment of Daniel's, and wrapped it about himself. And lo, the "Hobo" coat was born. "Hobo", by the way, is one of my favourite words, a concertina of HOmeward BOund.
I do not lie, the cat under a hyperthermia blanket
Mr Wesley was taken with a piece he picked off the floor
And lo, the Hobo coat!
So, here's the rub - the denim is being washed for us, then we will make our jeans, take them down to the Thames at low tide, take off our shoes and socks, go for a paddle and beat them there on the rocks. A more authentic pair of London Strides you will not find. It's not in the same league as my celluloid above, needless to say, but this parody of a scene in "American Psycho" is a rare treat for those who like the best but don't need to be a d*ck about it: http://elitedaily.com/humor/hipsters-ruin-everything-this-denim-ad-parodies-the-best-scene-from-american-psycho-video/
Bedlam, where jeans come true!
To conclude this evening, we were proud fit to pop-by-proxy when our pals Nile and Scott scooped the lot at the Grammys this time last week. Song, record, video, sound, they won it all. Bedlam dresses the best! When in doubt, accessorise with awards -
Well done gentlemen, the sixty gun salute has sounded from the ramparts of Bedlam!
Another linen jacket, this one made for Grant, was lined in saucy silk (found at http://www.biddlesawyersilks.com), as sensuous as diving into a tub of ice cream. What appears to be frost flakes are, on closer inspection, licentious ladies in the throes of a Busby Berkeley routine:
